Hey guys and gals, its Shadow12 here with the latest installment of A Different Journey!

First of all I would like to thank each and every one of you who reviewed/PMed me on which Pokémon Ash should get. It was with numerous debates and the like that the first five Pokémon were decide, two of which are in this chapter, but the last three will be announced in the closing Author's note and will be pretty spaced out.

Disclaimer: I DO NOT own Pokémon or any of the associated franchises.

Chapter 2: Taking The First Steps

"Stop that thing! We can't afford to allow such a rare Pokémon to escape, not after the trouble we went through to catch it the first time!"

He ran, as fast as he could on his stubby legs. He couldn't even remember how he got into this situation. All that he could though was waking up in a dark room, in a cage, and surrounded by several humans dressed in dark cloths, discussing what they were going to do with him.

Everything after that had been a blur to him before he found himself running through a strange forest in an attempt to escape from his captors. However, he was injured already and couldn't move very fast.

Chancing a quick feel behind him as he could not see by normal means, he suddenly picked up the pace. His captures were right behind him.

"Go, Zubat!"

He suddenly heard two voices calling out the same thing and the cries of the Pokémon's name from different spots behind him.

"Use Shadow Ball!"

He cried out in pain as the attack impacted his back a sent him crashing into a tree.

His captors grinned sinisterly as they stood in front if his defeated form. "Ha-ha, compared to before this thing was easy to recapture! Now Zubats, use another shadow Ball to make sure it doesn't give us any more trouble!" one of them, a woman with long red hair ordered. The other two, one a man with shoulder length blue hair and a Meowth, which was oddly standing on its hind legs and had its front paws crossed infront of its chest.

Sensing the attacks building, he braced himself for the inevitable. However, just before the attacks could launch another voice call out an attack, only this time it wasn't for him.

"Gible, stop them with Dragon Rage!"

Several minuet's earlier

Ash smiled and enjoyed the scenery as he walked along the forested path to Viridian City. He'd already seen a few Pokémon along the way, mostly Pidgey and a few Rattata, but they really weren't all that appealing choices for potential captures to him.

Don't get him wrong, Ash knew that he would need a wide variety of Pokémon, to truly have a chance of taking on the Pokémon league, let alone any gyms. He wouldn't be able to rely entirely on dragon types alone and despite his reluctance to admit it, Ash knew it.

Dragon types, while highly superior to most of the basic types, like fire, grass, water and electric types, all shared one major weakness. Ice. All draconic Pokémon, no matter the species or secondary typing, were all weak against Pokémon who were of the ice type; or those that knew ice type attacks.

Then that added to the fact that dragons were at their weakest against fairy types as they completely immune to dragon attacks and steel types where highly resistant to them and Ash knew he could not hope to beat any of the leagues as he was bound to go against a good number of trainers who favored Pokémon of those groups. So, to counter this opposition on his journey, Ash had decided to catch Pokémon of other types and train them all equally, no matter the species or type.

However, that being said, any dragons or dragon like Pokémon he would wind up catching, would be his first picks in any of his battles and if not, there'd be at least one held in reserve. Ash was going to make sure he caught more dragon types than any other on his journey.

It was like he had explained to Gible the night before. Dragon types always were and always would be his specialty and passion.

Ash was startled from his musings when he felt Gible tense on his head and there was a sudden rustling from the bushes to his right.

Imagine his surprise when he saw a yellow mouse like Pokémon, with pointed black tipped ears, three brown stripes down its back, red spots on both its cheeks and a zigzagged tail jump out and start to growl at the due threateningly.

Looking at the little Pokémon curiously Ash pulled his Pokédex and pointed it at the Pokémon as he hit the scan button.

The machine dinged and buzzed out the Pokémon's information.

"Pikachu, the Mouse Pokémon, and the evolved form of Pichu. Pikachu's tail is sometimes struck by lightning as it raises it to check its surroundings. If threatened, it loses electric charges from the sacks on its cheeks. This Pikachu is male, and has the ability Static. Currently this Pikachu knows the attacks; Thunder Shock, Tail Whip, Agility and Quick Attack."

"A Pikachu, eh?" Ash muttered, looking up at the yellow mouse.

Said mouse only continued to spark its cheeks and glare at them.

Ash looked up to Gible, who in turn looked down at him. A silent conversation passed between the two before they simultaneously nodded and Gible jumped down from her trainers head to face against the Pikachu.

"Gi, Gible!" she cried in challenge.

Pikachu in turn cried out his own name in acceptance of the challenge. "Pikachu!"

Ash grinned to himself. This was it; time to see if he had what it took to be a Pokémon trainer.

Deciding to start things off, Ash called out the first move. "Okay Gible, use Tackle!"

Gible gave a nod of confirmation before charging at the rodent like Pokémon.

The Pikachu apparently didn't like this much as he suddenly dodged to the side, allowing Gible to run right by him and into a tree before launching his own attack.

His body lit up in a brilliant light as a narrow arc of electricity shot straight towards Gible's downed form. The duel dragon/ground type only grunted as it hit seeing as it was that same combination that made sure the attack hardly affected her.

Ash grimaced when he saw his partner get hit but it quickly turned into a smirk when he saw her getting up, "Hit it with Dragon Rage!"

Gible growled angrily at the rodent in front of her but heeded her trainer's orders and a dark red glow began to emit from her stomach as the draconic energy built with her. It was only a few seconds later that Gible opened her mouth wide and shot a large beam of red energy shaped like that of a dragon's head at her opponent.

The beam raced across the small amount of distance between the two Pokémon faster than Ash could follow and the Pikachu only had time to blink in surprise before it hit him and sent him flying a good dozen feet or so before he crashed against a tree and fell to the ground in a heap. Clearly unconscious.

Ash could only watch this with wide eyes. That dragon rage; it was by far stronger than he had expected it to be from his starter. But then his mind started to think logically. Gible had had a trainer before him, and despite having been abandoned she would have much more battle experience than the average starter would. But still, to take out an opponent with one attack? Putting it lightly, that was simply amazing.

Ash was pulled out of his thoughts when he felt Gible tugging on his pants leg and pointing to the unconscious Pokémon.

"Ble! Gi! Gible!" she exclaimed, waving her stubby arm at the downed Pokémon.

Ash got the message and quickly extracted a Pokeball from the confines of his back pocket and enlarged it with a tap of the button at its center and threw it at Pikachu. "Go, Pokeball!"

His aim was true and the Pokeball hit the fainted Pokémon dead center on the forehead. The ball opened and sucked Pikachu inside in a beam of red energy. Once that was done it fell to the dirt ground and began to gently rock from side to side with the center glowing red.

It shook once, twice and a third time before finally stopping and letting off a small 'ping' to signify the capture was complete.

Walking over, Ash picked up the Pokeball, and stared at it momentarily before turning back to Gible as a wide grin made its way to his face.

"Alright we caught a Pikachu!" he exclaimed. "I had no idea you were so powerful Gible. That Dragon Rage was stronger than I expected." He complimented as he turned to his starter.

Gible closed her eyes and flexed her small arms in an attempt to show her strength causing Ash to chuckle at her until they heard a loud pain filled scream ring through the forest. "!"

However, before Ash could react he heard something else, a voice in his head. 'Go, Chosen One. Help my child, and in return he shall be one of your strongest companions.'

Startled, Ash's eyes narrowed and looked over to Gible. He decided to heed the voice's advice. "Come on! We gotta help who ever that was!" he said and the duo took off.

As he went, Ash didn't notice the small ripple in the air as something moved behind him and the presence that accompanied it. The presence nodded as it watched Ash sprint away.

"I have given you the necessary tools for you to make your path, young Ash. Now it is your choice on how to move forward." It said as the rippling stopped and the presence vanished.

Ash sprinted through the forested area as fast as he could in the direction he'd heard the scream come from with Gible right on his heels. For such a small creature like she was, Gible was surprisingly fast.

It only took a few minutes of running for Ash to make out a small clearing up ahead, where he saw two people, a man and a woman if he guessed right, each dressed in a black uniform with a large red R on the front and all of them had two Zubats and a Meowth in front of them, surrounding…something.

As he got closer, he noticed that something was a small Pokémon, heavily battered and bruised and lying at the base of a tree, it looked like it was on its last legs and was only just hanging on to consciousness. What made it worse was that each of the Zubats was charging an attack in the form of a black orb infront of their mouths; Shadow Ball if he remembered his studies correctly.

Eyes widening, Ash quickly ordered Gible into action. "Gible, stop them with Dragon Rage!"

Gible didn't even bother with a response and immediately charged the attack. The red dragon shaped beam once again shot from her mouth not two seconds later and sped through the clearing, hitting the first of the Zubats and then carrying it with it as it continued on to impact the other, sending them flying off somewhere into the forest.

With that, Ash with Gible slightly ahead of him, burst into the clearing. He skid to a halt and stood in front of the injured Pokémon protectively.

He never saw the Pokémon's awed face as it 'felt' him defend him.

xXx

Ash glared at the trio before him, who were by now getting over their shock and realizing what happened.

"How dare you interfere with us!? Get away from here and leave all your Pokémon or we'll force you to!" the woman shouted threateningly.

Ash ignored her for the time being and turned his head to look at the downed Pokémon behind him. "Don't worry." He assured it, noting how strange it looked. It was familiar to him in a way, but he couldn't place where he'd saw it from at the moment. "I'll protect you."

The Pokémon though, 'stared' at the human before it with a surprised look but couldn't help the hopeful feeling that bloomed in its chest at the humans words, and it nodded to show it heard him.

Ash grinned slightly before turning his attention back to the trio dressed in black. "What do you think you're doing!" he questioned angrily. "Ganging up on a Pokémon whose this badly hurt! Just what type of trainers are you!?"

The man sneered in response, "Get lost kid, you can't hope to understand the greatness of Team Rocket!"

"Greatness?" Ash questioned them before he snarled at the man who had spoken. "How is ganging up on an injured Pokémon greatness?! How is attacking them when they're already down greatness?! How can any of that be greatness?!"

Angry looks met his eyes at the question. "Like I said, boy, you wouldn't understand what Team Rocket stands for, so give us your Pokémon and get lost already!" The man retorted.

Ash glared at the men, "and what? Let you continue to beat on innocent Pokémon like this?" he gestured to the Pokémon behind him. "Sorry, but you'll have to get by me first!"

The lone woman of the group smirked and drew out a Pokeball. "If that's what it'll take, then so be it." She said and tossed the ball forward, "Go, Ekans!"

Ekans appeared to be a serpentine like creature that greatly resembled a Rattle Snake in appearance. The only differences were that it was entirely purple, it had a large yellow stripe near its head, and its mouth had no visible teeth and a large round tongue.

Ash raised an eye brow at the small snake like Pokémon but quickly shook it off when the Team Rocket member called for an attack.

"Use Bite Ekans!" as soon as the order was given Ekans shot off like a rocket (no pun intended) at Gible, its mouth glowing a bright white.

Ash growled slightly. "Dodge and then use Sand Attack!"

Gible immediately threw herself to the left and began swiping her hands at the ground, throwing clouds of dust at Ekans and obscuring its sight.

The snake Pokémon growled as some of the sand got into its eyes and started to rub at them with its tail as Gible continued with the attack.

"Shake it off and use Poison Sting!" the woman ordered when she saw this and Ekans quickly followed it's orders as it fired several purple needles from its mouth at Gible from within the sand cloud, however, the attack was slightly to the left of Gible, completely missing her and hitting a nearby tree. Ash grinned to himself; the battle was his.

"Stop and use Take Down!" he ordered.

Instantly, Gible ceased her attack and charged into the cloud of sand as an aurora of golden light surrounded her.

The next thing Ash or the Rocket members heard was a cry of pain from the cloud and Ekans shot out of it, only to land at its trainer's feet; heavily battered and bruised, but still ready for battle.

"Ekans!" It growled angrily as it shakily got up and glared at Gible's form, which was now visible since the Sand Attack had died down.

Gible flinched as the recoil damage of her attack hit, but she shook the pain off and stood ready for more. The last thing she wanted to do now was let her trainer down when it really mattered.

Ash frowned when he saw her flinch and berated himself for being reckless with that last attack. Take Down was a double edged move that hurt both the user and the one it was being used on, and even if the user only took a quarter of the damage the opponent did, using the move was still risky and more than a little reckless.

Had Ash gotten the timing wrong it would have left Gible wide open for a retaliation attack and being as close as she would have been, there would have been no way Ekans would have missed her; leaving her to deal with both the attack's damage plus Take Down's recoil. It didn't help much when she was still injured slightly from her battle with Pikachu earlier either. They were extremely lucky the attack had landed instead of missing to say the least.

He was snapped out of it when Gible turned to him and offered him a thumb up to assure him she could keep going. Nodding to his partner, Ash grinned to himself again and ordered her into action once again.

"End this with another Dragon Rage and give it as much as you got!"

He knew it was probably more than a little over kill to order such an attack, but Ash was not going to take any chances of the other Rocket member getting ideas of calling out any other Pokémon he may have on him and wanted to make sure they got the hint with this last attack.

Gible looked at her opponent fiercely as she began charging the attack for the third time that day, only this time she put more power into it than she ever had before and pretty soon there was a larger than average orb of red energy in her mouth before she launched it.

The resulting dragon shaped beam was almost three times as big as it had been before and the crooks and lone Pokémon could only watch as it sped towards them before it hit Ekans and exploded with a loud 'BOOM', launching said crooks and Pokémon into the air and into the distance.

Oddly enough Ash could barely make out three voices saying, "Team Rocket's blasting off!" before they were silenced. (1)

Despite this, Ash was awed once more at the shocking display of power his little Gible had at her disposal and had to remind himself; again, that she already had more power than average due to having been trained up before her abandonment.

Turning to look at his small starter Ash was once again shocked at the look of surprise that she herself wore as she surveyed the left over crater her attack had caused, which was pretty large and had taken out a fair few trees as well. Could Gible really be that powerful without even knowing it?

Her shock was only momentary though and she turned to Ash with a large grin and ran to him and sprang up to his head where she clamped down on it with her teeth.

Crying out in a mix of surprise, laughter and a small amount of pain, Ash looked up at his partner. "That was great Gible!" he exclaimed. "I don't see how your old trainer could of let you go, because if that wasn't strong then I don't know what was!"

Although slightly saddened at the reminder of her old trainer, Gible grinned happily and tightened her teeth against Ash's head to show it.

They were broken out of their little moment by a pained groan from behind them and they turned to the Pokémon they had been protecting and winced at the condition it was in.

The Pokémon was a small blue quadrupedal creature with black fur covering its head and neck, concealing everything but its mouth from view. The hair on its head was spiked into a small horn like structure and it had a short tail. However, that was about as much as either of the duo was able to make out, as the rest of the Pokémon was covered in numerous cuts, bruises and what looked to be blood, both old and new.

Ash's eyes widened, now he realized where he had seen this Pokémon from; he'd seen several pictures of it in his when he was studying about Dragon types!

"A Deino?" he muttered to himself before the seriousness of the situation hit him. He needed to help the poor thing in any way he could, he needed to get it to a Pokecenter.

Deino 'eyed' the human carefully as he knelt before him. Even though he had 'seen' how he had protected him, he was still being cautious.

Ash smiled gently down at the injured creature and reached into his back pocket to bring out a pokeball and held it out to Deino. Already expanded.

"Hey Deino," he started as his grin turned a little regret full. "I wish there was a better way for me to do this, but you need to get to a Pokecenter fast and I can only get you there fast enough is if you let me catch you. You can choose if you want to stay with me or not after you're all healed. Is that alright with you?"

Deino continued to stare at him for a few more seconds before sighing and extending his neck just enough for his forehead to touch the button at the pokeball's center, allowing it to suck him into it in a red beam of energy.

He gave no fight against the process and the ball immediately pinged to show a complete capture.

'I'm sorry Deino, I really am, but this is the only way.' Ash thought, sighing softly as he stood and looked up to Gible, who he noticed was looking more than a little worn out as well. "You should rest up some too girl. You've had a long day." he told her as he pulled her pokeball from the belt around his waist.

Gible smiled a grateful smile and allowed Ash to return her to her ball for a nice rest.

Ash sighed again as he stowed Gible's ball back on his belt and took off in the direction he knew Viridian City to be in.

1.) Forgive me, but I could not possibly resist adding in the three stooges there.

And cut!

Wow that took a bit of time to figure out how to get right.

So both Pikachu and Deino join Ash and Gible. The reason for Pikachu was because several people have asked for him to be in this and I really couldn't deny them that as I myself am a major Pikachu fan and it wouldn't feel right if the little guy was not with Ash. As for Deino, well he wasn't really my first choice for that scene but he kinda popped into my head right when I started the chapter and I couldn't write it any other way without it sounding wrong.

I hope the battles were to everyone's liking as I have no experience when it comes to writing them.

As promised here's the list of Ash's first five catches.

Pikachu

Deino

Squirtle

Bulbasaur

Charmander (Shiny)

Ash will have more Pokemon then he caught in cannon as the challenge asks, but the rest of them will be announced as the story progresses.

And it might be awhile before the next one comes out as I've recently been thinking of watching the Pokémon anime since I'm a bit out of touch with the original story line.

See ya next time and please review!